Viking Era

How much labor did it take to construct a Viking longship?

Replica of Viking longship – “The Sea Stallion – Viking Ship” by infomatique is licensed under CC BY-SA 2.0

This is another in my series of posts on ancient finances.

Let’s ponder how much time it would take to construct a Viking longship and consider how much of an investment that would be for a community. Any way you look at this, a longship is a major capital asset.

(Cross post from Attestation Update.)

One estimate of time to build a longship

Philip Line, in his book The Vikings and Their Enemies – Warfare in Northern Europe, 750 -1100 written in 2014, provides one framework for the investment in a longship.

I’ll quote and then expand his comment on page 51:

“Experimental archaeologists have estimated that 40,000 working hours may have been needed to produce all the components of a 30-meter longship, consuming the surplus production of 100 persons for a year.”

Surplus production in the Viking context would be the amount of time not needed for subsistence living. In other words the amount of effort a warrior would have after raising enough food to feed his family with enough left over to survive the next winter.

If 40,000 hours is enough time for 100 warriors, that would be 400 hours each. Let’s assume that would be spread over a year except for my assumption that during the worst three months of winter no construction could be done. Since we are talking rough numbers let’s spread that 400 hours over nine months, which would be 44 hours a month, which would be about 11 hours a week.

So 100 warriors working 11 hours a week for 9 months would be needed to construct a longship.

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Viking Era

One last piece of background on brutality of ancient wars before diving into Viking history – part 4

Viking longship illustration. Image courtesy of Adobe Stock.

One last post on the harsh brutality of warfare in ancient days before diving into what few financial tidbits are visible from the Viking Age.

The Sea Wolves: A History of the Vikings, by Lars Brownsworth, points out there was plenty of brutality to go around.

In footnote 57 on page 273 he tells us there are reports that several churches in southeastern England that used the flayed skin of Vikings to upholster the doors to their building.

(Cross post from Attestation Update.)

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Roman Empire, Viking Era

Some background on brutality of ancient wars before diving into Viking history – part 3

Seeing a few of these Viking longships rapidly approach your shores in the 800s was a sign your village was about to have a very bad day. Image courtesy of Adobe Stock.

One more post to provide context on the reputation of barbarity that is owned by the Vikings.

A wonderful book, The Vikings, from the British Museum and Metropolitan Museum of Art, is a catalog of a fabulous exhibit assembled by the two museums in 1980. The major exhibit showcased the artifacts and cultures of the Viking era.

(Cross post from Attestation Update.)

I’m reading my dad’s copy of the book. The text is still available on Amazon in the used market.

The goal of the exhibit was to introduce some balance to the competing visions of raw brutality and “strange glamour” that surrounds the Vikings.

Consider these two comments in the preface:

“In a brutal age the Vikings were brutal, but their brutality was no worse than their contemporaries. “

and

“The Vikings were administrators as well as pirates, merchants as well as robbers. “

Before you get worked up about blood eagles…

Oh, and if you get all worked up about the brutal cold-blooded barbarity of a ‘blood eagle’ execution, try looking up what the oh so very civilized English did when they hung, drew, and quartered someone.

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Alexander the Great, Viking Era

Some background on brutality of ancient wars before diving into Viking history – part 2

Illustration of a very well armed Viking. One had to be well off to afford a sword and rather rich to have a helmet and mail to protect the neck. Image courtesy of Adobe Stock.

I’m going to take a look at finances of the Viking era.

Before doing so, I’d like to provide some context of the horrid barbarity of warfare in ancient times.

Previous post mentions the slaughter during the Roman destruction of Jerusalem.

(Cross post from Attestation Update.)

Next I’ll describe the gathering of slaves by Alexander the Great accompanying his path of destruction across the ancient world. Today we would call that human trafficking.

People taken away into slavery by Alexander the Great

I previously made some guesses how many slaves were taken by Alexander the Great. See my post on 2/2/17: Wild guess on the tally of people enslaved by Alexander the Great.

Professor Frank Holt did a lot of research on the plunder taken by Alexander: The Treasures of Alexander the Great: How One Man’s Wealth Shaped the World.

In Appendix 2, the professor tallied the known and unknown references to plunder and slaves.

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Alexander the Great, Roman Empire, Viking Era

Some background on brutality of ancient wars before diving into Viking history – 1 of 2

Viking warrior with sword standing near Drakkar on the seashore. I think that is an ax on his belt. Raiding has paid off well since he is illustrated wearing chain mail. Longboat in background, which was shock and awe stealth technology in the 9th and 10th centuries. Image courtesy of Adobe Stock.

I’m going to take a look at finances of the Viking era, similar to what I’ve done on legionnaires during the Roman Empire and the plunder gathered by Alexander the Great. There isn’t a lot of information available, but I’ll look at some I was able to find.

The Viking era has recently captured my interest, leading me to read a fair amount on the history of the times.

(Cross post from Attestation Update.)

This is the first time I have dived deep into the adventures of the Norwegians, Danes, and Swedes back then.

My paternal grandfather and grandmother both emigrated from Norway, settling in South Dakota before meeting each other, marrying, and starting a large family.

So it is appropriate to dive into my ancient legacy, later in life though it may be than for most of my cousins.

Why a series of posts on finance in the Viking world? Because I want to.

One of the things I learned early on in blogging is that a person should write on what is of interest. An audience will develop or not, but cannot be predicted. Thus, a blogger should write on what is of interest.

Why post this discussion on this blog? Because this is where I write of accounting issues and it is a short jump into financial issues such banking in general because I am interested in banking and finance. From there is a very short trip to the wide, ever expanding world of banking fiascos. From there, it is possible to jump back a couple of millenniums to ancient finances of Rome and Alexander. From Rome it is merely a few centuries forward to the Vikings. All of that fits within a blog on accounting.

Before I get started

One of the aspects of the Viking era that jumps out is the violence and the widespread plundering.

Several accounts I’ve read say that capturing slaves on raids and selling them into the Arab worlds was more lucrative that making off with all the gold and silver you can find and the loot you can carry.

The ancient world was astoundingly violent.

I’d like to offer two of many possible illustrations.

Roman destruction of Jerusalem

In 70 A.D. the Roman Empire laid siege to Jerusalem, sacked it, and destroyed the entire city, killing essentially everyone crowded behind the city wall at the time. The euphemism is that apart from one wall and one tower, there was not so much as one stone left on top of another anywhere in the city.

The wall and tower were left so that for centuries to come, everyone can see this is what will be left if you go too far in irritating Rome.

Remember forever: Rome did this.

Don’t. Mess. With. Rome.

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Alexander the Great

Wild guess on the tally of people enslaved by Alexander the Great

Statue of Alexander the Great at Thessaloniki, Greece. Image courtesy of Adobe Stock.
Statue of Alexander the Great at Thessaloniki, Greece. Image courtesy of Adobe Stock.

One more followup on the human devastation caused by Alexander the Great.

There are a lot of posts on my blog discussing Professor Frank Holt’s delightful book, The Treasures of Alexander the Great: How One Man’s Wealth Shaped the World.

(Cross post from Attestation Update.)

In Appendix 2, the professor tallies the reported plunder, tribute, and other resources seized by Alexander the Great. Quantifying the destruction is not possible because the ancient literature often does not quantify amounts, only that slaves, or plunder, or cattle, or tapestries, or something else was seized.

The professor does quantify the reported information in an algebraic format. I’ve previously mentioned:

Total proceeds from the wars is then estimated in a formula expressed as 81.67( X) +311,761.

The author guesses the grand total for his years of campaigning at something between 300,000 and 400,000 talents. With the fixed portion of the second estimate at 311k, I think the total would be well over 300k.

Those amounts are in talents, with each talent being a massive amount of wealth. For an order of magnitude, consider that my guess is an ancient Athenian talent would be expressed something somewhere in the range of around $28M today.

I just went through the Appendix looking at the tally of slaves taken.

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Alexander the Great

Total cost of Alexander’s rampage

Tetradrachm from era of Alexander the Great. Image courtesy Adobe Stock.
Tetradrachm from era of Alexander the Great. Image courtesy Adobe Stock.

This will be my final post on the finances of Alexander the Great.

Professor Frank Holt’s book The Treasures of Alexander the Great: How One Man’s Wealth Shaped the World explains the ancient record does not give us enough details to estimate the total expenses paid by Alexander as he rampaged around the world.

(Cross post from Attestation Update.)

The total expenses based on identifiable items in historical narratives is aggregated by the professor in a formula as:

  • 189( X) + 69,176 talents

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Alexander the Great

A few stray tidbits on the cost of Alexander’s military

Ancient Greek coins. Image courtesy of Adobe Stock.
Ancient Greek coins. Image courtesy of Adobe Stock.

Professor Frank Holt’s book The Treasures of Alexander the Great: How One Man’s Wealth Shaped the World explains there is little in the historical record on the cost or size of Alexander’s military. Here are a few tidbits which are visible.

(Cross post from Attestation Update.)

Navy

Alexander learned to appreciate the value of a Navy. One data point is that in 334 BC he had 200 ships operating in the Aegean sea. No quantification mentioned of naval forces elsewhere at that or any other time.

Army

Figuring out how much Alexander spent to field his military forces is a game of stringing together many wild guesses. The author accumulated his own long string of guesses and assumptions for small units. He also quotes several other studies.

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Alexander the Great

Some tidbits on the spending side of Alexander the Great’s reign

Ancient Greek coin. Alexander the Great and Apollo with the chariot of the sun. Image courtesy of Adobe Stock.
Ancient Greek coin. Alexander the Great and Apollo with the chariot of the sun. Image courtesy of Adobe Stock.

I have been discussing Professor Frank Holt’s book The Treasures of Alexander the Great: How One Man’s Wealth Shaped the World . You can find other posts on the ancient finances tag.

The second half of the book explores Alexander’s spending. There is even less historical information available on his spending than on his looting.

(Cross post from Attestation Update.)

One part caught my eye.

Alexander built about 13 major cities according to the educated guess in the book. That doesn’t include dozens of small villages or all the sundry fortifications.

One of these cities, Ai Khanoum, had three miles of wall, which is guessed to have taken 3,000 workers six months to build.

How much would that construction cost? I will make a wild guess.  (more…)

Other eras

The incredible wealth of Mansa Musa, the ancient emperor of Mali

Image courtesy of DollarPhotoClub.
Map of Mali courtesy of DollarPhotoClub.

Barron’s suggests Mansa Musa, the Emperor of Mali in the 1300s, was the richest man who ever lived.

Since I firmly believe that I am richer today than John D. Rockefeller was back in 1916, I would also insist that I am, right now, richer than Mansa Musa was in 1324. But that isn’t the point of the story. I’ll mention travel costs momentarily.

(Cross post from Attestation Update.)

The 7/23 article from Barron’s gives a glimpse into ancient finances by wondering Who Was the Richest Person Who Ever Lived? / The Emperor of Mali lived on top of a 14th century Goldmine so prolific that it probably made him the richest person who ever lived.

Musa Keita I is referred to as Mansa, or Emperor, Musa. He was born somewhere around 1280 and died somewhere around 1337. He was the ruler of the Mali Empire which stretched across Western Africa.

Consider the economic resources in the area: gold and salt.

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